you guys should check out nasa's world wind virtual globe. originally an open source virtual globe, if you know how to program you can customize it however you want for whatever your uses. i think it's better than google earth but it's a little more complex

Here is another website that I just came across (Global Incident Map) - it's a virtual representation of terrorist-related events and other 'suspiciuos activity' around the world. If you click on the icons, it'll show you the event details with what's going on: